Packages



* 066.30, 1969 E-.A.sK|N-NE'R 3,486,613

PACKAGES Filed May 1, 1968 dlivenir A Home ys Bx WTYW United States Patent 3,486,613 PACKAGES Edward A. Skinner, Welwyn Garden City, England, as-

signor, by mesne assignments, to Aerpat A.G., Zug,

Switzerland Filed May 1, 1968, Ser. No. 725,772 Claims priority, application G1}e6a7t Britain, May 11, 1967,

Int. Cl. B65d 33/00 US. Cl. 206-56 7 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A package for a row of tubular rivets in line end-toend comprises a paper tape and a narrower tape of transparent adhesive plastics. The row of rivets is positioned centrally along the paper tape with the adhesive tape overlying the row, the edges of the adhesive tape being sealed to the paper tape on each side of the row. Both tapes are deformed around the heads of the rivets to retain the rivets in position. A narrow masking tape between the adhesive tape and the rivets prevents the rivets coming into contact with the adhesive.

Preferably the strips are fastened together as aforesaid by adhesive means, and preferably the said adhesive means is provided by an adhesive coating on at least one of the strips.

In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the adhesive coating is on only one of the strips. In that case, it may be that the non-adhesive strip is wider than the adhesive-coated strip whereby an uncovered part of the non-adhesive strip extends along the container on each side of the row of articles.

The package may include an additional blanking or masking strip positioned between the row of articles and the or each adhesive-coated strip, thereby to prevent the articles from coming into contact with the adhesive.

. The invention includes a package as aforesaid, in which the articles in the container each has a bore or aperture therethrough, the articles being arranged in the container, and held thereby, so that the apertures are in alignment and provide a substantially straight substantially continuous bore from one end of the row of articles to the other.

A specific embodiment of the invention will now be described by way of example and with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

FIGURE 1 is a plan view of a package of tubular rivets (part being shown broken away for convenience of illustration);

FIGURE 2 is a longitudinal section through the package, taken on the line II-II of FIGURE 1, the rivets being shown not in section;

FIGURE 3 is a transverse section, on an enlarged scale, through the package, taken on the line IIIIII of FIGURE 2; and

FIGURE 4 is an elevation, to the same enlarged scale,

I of one of the rivets in the package.

3,486,613 Patented Dec. 30, 1969 ice The package of this example contains a number of rivets, one of which is shown in FIGURE 4. Each rivet comprises a tubular body 11 with a transverse enlargement in the form of a head 12 at one end. The length of the rivet is substantially greater than the head diameter, and a bore 13 extends axially throughout the length of the rivet.

In the package a number of these rivets are arranged in a row with the tail end of one rivet closely in contact with the head of the next rivet. The bores of all the rivets are aligned so that they form a substantially continuous substantially straight bore (at least when the package, which is flexible, is supported in a suitable configuration), the heads of all the rivets facing towards the same direction (towards the right as viewed in FIGURES 1 and 2). The package of this example is twelve inches long and contains about eighteen rivets.

The container of this example comprises two separate strips 14, 15 in superposed relationship, the strip 15 being placed on the strip 14 with the row of rivets between the two strips. The strip 14 is of paper and is one inch wide. One sort of paper strip which has been found satisfactory is that which is commonly employed for punching information in coded perforations in connection with data processing equipment. The strip 15 is a transparent vinyl plastics tape, for example, such as is commercially available under the trademark Sellotape, about one-half of an inch wide, positioned centrally on the wider tape 14 to leave two edge strips 19 thereof uncovered. The face of the vinyl tape 15 which is towards the paper tape 14 is coated with a suitable adhesive. By means of this adhesive the two strips 14, 15 are fastened together along at each side of the row of rivets over two elongated areas 16 along the opposite edges of the strip 15.

In this example, that central part of the face of the strip 15 which overlies the row of rivets is rendered plastics tape, for example, such as is commercially availnon-adhesive, so that the strip 15 does not adhere to the rivets. This is achieved by an additional blanking or masking strip 17, also of vinyl plastics, which is positioned centrally along the strip 15 between that strip 15 and the rivets. It has a non-adhesive face towards the row of rivets (its other face could be adhesive but this is unnecessary since it is in contact with the adhesive face of strip 15) and is of sufiicient width to prevent the adhesive face of the strip 15 from contacting the rivets. It is found that if the adhesive face of the strip 15 does contact the rivet tails, the tail end of each rivet tends to adhere to the tape so that the rivet bores are no longer in alignment (at least with rivets of length substantially greater than the head diameter). Furthermore the adhesive may remain on the rivets after they have been removed from the package.

The various strips are deformed around the heads of the rivets in the row to retain the rivets in position. The actual shape of the deformations depends upon the exact dimensions of the rivets, the mechanical properties of the strips, and the pressure with which the strips are pressed together around the rivets.

It will be seen from FIGURE 3 that, in this example, a part 18 of the head of each rivet penetrates the paper tape 14. The torn edges of the paper strip at each penetration assist in supporting the rivet head to a certain extent, the rivet head being held towards the paper tape by the pressure of the tape 15 above it. Moreover each rivet is in contact with the two rivets one on each side of it (in an axial direction), which also assists in supporting the rivet. It is found that all the rivets, once initially arranged between the strips with their bores in alignment, retain their position so that the bores remain substantially in alignment, at least suflicientlyfor a mandrel 3 of a continuous-feed riveting gun (such as that widely known under the trademark Chobert) to be threaded through all the rivets, from end to end of the row, so that it supports them all. The strips of the container can then be quickly removed (e.g. by using the blanking strip 17 as a tear strip, or by grasping one or both of the edges 19 of the paper strip 14 and pulling the strip away). Alterntaively, as the mandrel has an enlarged head which contacts the tail of the tailward rivet (on the extreme left in FIGURES 1 and 2), it may be possible to pull the mandrel with the row of rivets on it axially out of the container, in the direction towards the right in FIGURES 1 and 2, at least with snaphead rivets of small diameter.

The example package described above is advantageous in that it is easily and cheaply fabricated, and also allows easy loading of the rivets and the mandrel of a riveting gun.

The invention is not restricted to the details of the foregoing example. For instance, the package may comprise articles other than tubular rivets. The inner face of one or both strips may be completely adhesive. An additional reinforcing strip may be provided, along the length of the container. Preferably it is aligned with the row of articles. In the package of the example, the reinforcing strip may be positioned between the row of rivets and the paper strip 14.

The blanking strip 17 may be omitted, thus allowing the adhesive face of the strip 14 to contact the articles. This may be so when, for example, the articles are rivets in which the axial length is substantially less than the transverse dimension over the transverse enlargement, in which case adhesion of the tail part of the rivet body 11 to the strip 14 is not a problem since there is insufiicient distance between successive rivet heads for the adhesive strip to sag and contact the rivet body.

I claim:

1. A package comprising a plurality of articles disposed in a row, each article having at least one transverse enlargement, and a container comprising two separate strips, at least one of which is of deformable material, in superposed relationship with the row of articles between them, the strips being fastened together at each side of the row of articles, and at least said deformable strip being deformed at intervals along its length to engage the said enlargements and thereby hold the articles in the container.

2. A package as claimed in claim, 1 in which each article in the container has a bore or aperture therethrough, the articles being arranged in the container, and held thereby, so that the apertures are in alignment and provide a substantially straight substantially continuous rbore from one end of the row of articles to the other.

3. A package as claimed in claim 1, in which said strips are fastened together by adhesive means.

4. A package as claimed in claim 3, in which the said adhesive means is provided by an adhesive coating on at least one of said strips.

5. A package as claimed in claim 4 including an additional blanking or masking strip positioned between the row of articles and said adhesive coated strip thereby to prevent the articles from coming into contact with said adhesive coating.

6. A package as claimed in claim 4, in which the adhesive coating is on only one of said strips.

7. A package as claimed in claim 4, in which said nonadhesive strip is wider than said adhesive-coated strip whereby an uncovered part of said non-adhesive strip extends along the container-on each side of the row of articles.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 11/ 1951 Slaughter 206 65 4/ 1955 Springate. 

